


No Tracks in the Snow

by enchanted_doughnut



Category: Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: M/M, Masochism, Season 8/Episode 3 Spoilers, Time Travel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-09
Updated: 2019-05-09
Packaged: 2020-02-28 19:22:26
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,517
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18762853
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/enchanted_doughnut/pseuds/enchanted_doughnut
Summary: The Night King was the only one who made Bran Stark feel alive.





	No Tracks in the Snow

 

Every time he looks back another part of Bran Stark dies. 

His destiny had already played out, he was merely retracing steps that he had not yet taken. He doesn’t fight it. Life is always moving; flowing and twisting. Carving out stone that could be washed away and crashing against that which couldn’t. He, Bran, the Three-Eyed Raven, knew that when he was pushed from the tower he had reached its end.

The only direction for him to go now, was back.

He watches Sansa wed Ramsay Bolton, the last of her innocence stained like white sheets. He watches Robb cup his wife’s belly, swearing to protect their never-born son. He watches Arya fumbling in the dark, searching for nothing. He watches Jon and Rickon die, and only one rise.

The more he sees, the more of him dies. Curiosity had once burned within him. Like a jar of wildfire was in his chest and The Mad King shouting at him to burn them all. And he did. That night in the cave, beneath the weirwood tree, they died in his wildfire and the Three-Eyed Raven rose from the ashes.

He is the memory of everything that has passed and what has yet to come. His heart is hollow and his body broken. He tries to live equally in both his present and all the others. He eats hearty food and wears warm furs, trying to make his own life as comfortable as possible.

His family love him, but he doesn’t love them back. Not anymore. He advises them because their lives have a path to follow, even if it’s not what they hope for. The Imp is starting to understand who he is, but struggles. For all his intelligence, Tyrion Lannister still thinks with his heart.

But underneath it all, underneath the wedding that ran red and the sept that shone green, the hand who trusted and the boy humiliated, Bran Stark still burns. Burning and burning until the jar shatters and wildfire spreads again, and Bran Stark looks back.

 And the Night King looks back at him.

His heart beats with fear and his hands shake. His vision narrows and all he can see are blue eyes staring at him, and Bran Stark is alive. His legs can move, but he is frozen. Biting snow swirls around them, the blizzard more deadly than any natural storm. The Night King of centuries past reaches out for him and Bran finally stumbles back.

He is in Winterfell and his arm is burning.

 

The noise in the hall is ringing in his ears. Metal tankards beat on wooden tables, voices rising to the stone ceiling where melting candles flickered. Cheer and happiness, bitterness and sorrow. A moon has passed, and the living are still enthralled by their victory. He doesn’t join in. The stew tastes bland and his stomach feels empty no matter how much he eats.  

He wants to leave, but Sansa forces him to stay. _‘You’re family. A Stark,’_ she says, and he doesn’t correct her. All he can focus on is the burning mark on his skin. The mark that should have disappeared that night, but now it hurts even more.

It’s what he thinks of when he goes back, again. When he’s standing in the middle of a frozen wasteland, an undead army surrounding him. He keeps his pace steady as he walks between the rows, but his heart races again. He reaches the front and blue eyes are watching him. He stares back, his feet steady this time.

Bran screams when the Night King’s hand wraps around his arm. His skin freezes and darkens, and agony rips through him. The Night King drags him to the weirwood, pressing him to the white bark. Bran wonders if the Night King has the same fate planned for Bran as the Children of the Forest did for him. Then the Night King reaches for his clothes, and Bran stops thinking and just lives.  

The weirwood weeps tears of blood.

*

He goes back. Again and again, until his body is mottled with his marks. He doesn’t let his family know that underneath his clothes, his body burns. He starts to piece together a past he’s only now living. The Night King who had seen thousands of years recognises him. He’s the one Bran seeks, the one who marks him and hurts him and makes him cry with pleasure he never knew before, nor would from anyone else’s hand.  

Bran can't learn his tongue, but he learns his expressions. He sees amusement, lust, jealousy, hatred. His curiosity turns into recklessness. They were two beings, once human, twisted by the Old Gods and their disciples. They were trapped in a destiny decided by others, their paths intertwined like maiden’s hair.

*

The younger Night King only knows the Three-Eyed Raven. He lashes out at Bran, intent to kill. Bran's scream of terror scares his carer who was napping by the base of the weirwood beside him. He hides his pain as poorly as Sansa hides her hopefulness. She asks about his mark and he tells her the Night King is dead. It was not a lie. 

She tells him not to go back. He wasn’t eating properly nor sleeping well. _‘Forget the Three-Eyed Raven. You’re still Bran Stark, second son of Eddard Stark and my younger brother,’_ she says to him.

She cares for him and he disappoints her, again.

 

He is no longer in Winterfell, but within a fallen mountain, green lights swimming across the dark sky above. In the centre, an ice altar stands, the Night King beside it. The Night King smiles when he approaches. Somewhere, a baby is crying and Bran turns, searching for it. The Night King guides him upon the altar and Bran decides he’ll look for the baby later. 

*

The memories of Bran Stark fuel his wildfire. He begins to pick out favoured moments, returning to them over and over, getting so close they threaten to overlap. Bran realises the fault in his eagerness when the Night King stares at him with such incredulousness, having been visited mere minutes before. 

But instead of turning him away, the Night King gestures him forward and makes him kneel in the snow before him. Bran’s body burns as he took pleasure from his own hand, his eyes clenched shut, unable to look up at the blue eyes watching him.

*

He goes further. 

He sees the Night King soon after the Children create him. He looks how Bran feels; two lives inside of him, not completely joined together. Anger rolls off him in icy waves, crashing down on the world around him. Furious and volatile, the Night King attacks the First Men and Children alike, for if he couldn’t have life then neither should they.

He stares at Bran for the first time, weary and unsure, and Bran keeps his distance.

*

The man can’t see Bran. He laughs with the other First Men, cutting logs and gutting rabbits for camp that evening. His skin is tanned and his hair is fair. He’s dressed in light cloth and leather armour, for this world is green and has not yet seen the endless winter he would bring. 

The First Men take turns keeping watch so the Children can’t sneak up on them with their perverse magic. He doesn’t see Bran watching him, nor the Children watching Bran. They wonder why the Three-Eyed Raven of millennia to come would look back so far, and what makes this man so special.  

*

_ ‘It is beautiful beneath the sea, but if you stay too long you’ll drown.’ _

He was drowning. The blue eyes narrowed upon him are cold and hostile, and Bran realises his mistake. Familiar fear courses through him; the fear he felt so long ago, from a time this Night King had not passed. The fear made him burn. It made him alive.

They are alone upon the frozen cliff, the snow beneath their boots gritty and windswept. Beyond the cliff lay a primitive village of tents made of hide, wild and unaware of the terrors about to fall upon them. He should leave and go to when the Night King welcomed his presence. But this Night King who only saw the Three-Eyed Raven doesn’t reach for his weapon. He stares only at Bran, waiting. 

And Bran, burning with wildfire, steps towards him. The air is frigid and he can’t breathe. Bran reaches a trembling hand out, touching his face. A thousand needles stab his skin as his fingers freeze, and Bran embraces it.

He leans forward and kisses him. Below, the screams of the wildlings rise.

*

Thousands of years are shared before they meet for the first time in Winterfell. The night is dark and the Night King brought the terrors with him. Men in the castle die and rise, their flames snuffed out by ice. Those still alive wonder if they will see the sun, again. 

They were two destinies, intertwined. And the Night King, who had lived through it all, stares down at Bran who had experienced none.

 

**Author's Note:**

> So, I’m kind of obsessed with this pairing right now and had to write something. Planning out the story, I thought I had such a deep, complex idea; then I realised that a) I had shamelessly stolen the concept from The Time Traveler’s Wife, and b) it really was just Bran using greensight to booty-call the Night King.


End file.
